The spirit of the age

No one except those with sickness in their hearts can make an issue of the message given on Thursday, March 21, by the crowds that packed the square set aside for the Newroz celebrations in Diyarbakır. That message was the message of a Turkey that has been advancing, with all its components, toward becoming one nation.

To see in this picture a sign of danger or risk that would weaken Turkey's unity or strength, one's eyes would really have to look differently and see differently. One must never think that the crowds that flocked to that square were people who support the BDP or Öcalan in all circumstances, or who are unconditionally attached to them. That square was packed to the brim that day because it gave the message of a solution. People's enthusiasm was not for this or that political view, but for the solution itself.

In essence, that square became the most important witness that there has never been a war between Kurds and Turks. In fact, the people who were frightened even by the possibility of a war between Turks and Kurds flocked to that square all the more. For that reason, it is hardly even necessary to take the event as a sign of peace between Kurds and Turks. The crowds that filled the square rushed there at the prospect of witnessing the meaninglessness of the armed struggle that the PKK has so persistently tried to continue until now. That is why Öcalan's call to "lay down arms" was greeted with great enthusiasm: it was precisely what those crowds wanted to hear and had been waiting to hear.

The "spirit of the age" that Öcalan pointed to in his letter had in fact found its most concrete expression in this very square. Those crowds bore witness, with their whole being, that the spirit of the age requires "farewell to arms, hello to politics."

Rest assured that if a different message had come out of that square, there would have been no such enthusiasm, and if a contrary message had been expected, those crowds would not have gathered at all. This is also the most important sign that political movements do not have absolute authority over their own bases. In other words, it shows that one dimension of authority, just like power in government, also operates from the bottom up.

Considering the examples frequently cited from Britain and Spain on how to end the terror problem in Turkey, almost everyone had become accustomed to the idea that solution and negotiation processes would last only for years. Yet this message from Öcalan, and the response that the square and the whole of Turkey gave to it, showed that others cannot be a model for Turkey. On this occasion we saw that the solution is not at all far from us.

Of course, the fact that the solution is this close is also made possible by the persistent restoration policies that the AK Parti government has been implementing for so long aimed at the main source of the problem. The official ending of the policies of assimilation and denial, and the democratizing steps taken regarding the lives of the Kurds, had in essence more than amply laid down all the sociological ground necessary for a solution. That is why Öcalan's messages were not perceived by his own base as a dishonorable surrender; on the contrary, they were perceived and applauded as the most fitting words that could be said at this stage of the process. Because, despite everything that has been done, the armed struggle no longer had any aspect that could be explained to the Kurds, or even to the Kurdish families whose children are in the mountains.

For those who still ask Öcalan or the BDP what they are laying down arms in return for, BDP leader Selahattin Demirtaş's statement, "The opposition that wants to finish off the AK Parti expects from the PKK what they themselves could not do," in essence summarizes very well that the PKK too no longer has any context for continuing the fight in this way on its own behalf.

In fact, thanks to the call for farewell to arms, through the current discourse and context, both İmralı and the BDP will find an immensely wide and respected political space before them. This space offers the opportunity to produce politics both for the Kurds and for Turkey in general. Could there be a better gain than this?

Of course, there are those who think this is too much of a gain for them, who see it as a loss for Turkey. These views are a result of the country's abnormality, whereas the process is at the same time a normalization, a restoration, that is, a process of reaching a level at which politicization is regarded not as a loss but as a gain.

SKOPJE, INTERNATIONAL BALKAN UNIVERSITY

In fact, I was watching the Diyarbakır square from Skopje, where I was at the invitation of the International Balkan University to give two talks titled "Globalization and Multiculturalism" and "Turkey's Foreign Policy in the Context of Changing Global Balances of Power." Prof. Şinasi Gündüz has been appointed rector of the university, which has been operating under the Skopje Education and Culture Foundation since 2001, as of the beginning of this year. Prof. Gündüz, whom we know from his time as Dean of the Faculty of Theology at Istanbul University, and whose competence as a historian of religions in his field is beyond dispute, has generated considerable synergy in Skopje with his rectorship. While Prof. Gündüz was there, he was pursuing the correspondence needed to have the university included in the ÖSYM catalog. That is, students who apply to ÖSYM this year will be able to study in Skopje, one of the three cities, along with Sarajevo and Novi Pazar, that Isa Bey founded, and which joined the Ottomans before Istanbul.

There was a great deal to be said about Skopje, and especially about the Balkan University, but the festive atmosphere that came with Diyarbakır and Nevruz did not allow for speaking longer on another subject; perhaps another time.